Shirley Lim Collection

Shirley Lim

Description

The short stories of Shirley Geok-lin Lim-born in Malacca, Malaysia and now Professor of English and Women's Studies at the University of California-reflect the complex mosaic of her world. From the rich Peranakan tradition of her childhood to the harsh perplexity of American life in adulthood, her writing bristles with violence, dislocation and psychic dismemberment. This collection brings you Lim's most memorable stories, along with her most recent work-written over four decades-from the tumultuous 1960s all through to our present day. "Lim has too much raw energy and even brutal power to be confined by her craft...-The Straits Times (Singapore)

Informations

• Publié par: MarshallCavendishM
• Date de parution: 01 juin 2011
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9789814484374
• Langue: English

Extrait

Shirley Lim s writing compels us to revisit the many homes we inhabit-our bodies, our languages, our families, our nations-as it crosses boundaries and nourishes, as it is nourished by, the experience of travel, translation, and looking back. Deeply personal and, at the same time, concerned with the wider implications of those experiences, this volume, which brings together stories and poems produced over the last four decades, traces Lim s perspectives and position as a woman and a writer compelled by questions of national identity, language, migration and homelands. Her creative production invites us to consider the interplay between the forces of race, ethnicity, gender, and nationality in our transcultural world. But these stories and poems, most evocatively, unveil the complexity of human lives, the range of our emotions, as she engages our relationships to our homes, to the people who made them, to our histories, and to the languages that shaped and continue to define those places and those experiences for us.
- R OC O G. D AVIS , City University of Hong Kong
In lifelong exile, Shirley Geok-lin Lim writes new poems from countries and islands all over the world. Her awed voice reaches our ears, and we get to know ourselves from myriad views. I love this poet who s not being an honest woman!
- M AXINE H ONG K INGSTON , author and winner of two National Book Awards
With tenderness, precision, and verve, acceptance and defiance, Shirley Geok-lin Lim sings a rich song of exile. Here are the lines of loss-of family, country, self-yet what is lost is also what is found, and these poems probe a woman s many and changing truths in language that will deepen the vision of every reader.
- A LICIA S USKIN O STRIKER , author and poet
While maintaining touch with her native Malacca, Shirley Lim manages to encompass a whole world beyond Malaysian shores ... There is throughout that certainty: no other word, no other form would express this thought, that feeling. [She] edges ahead of her rivals by the sheer confidence of her verse.
- M ARTIN G OFF , Book Trust, announcing the Commonwealth Poetry Prize
(Crossing the Peninsula)

2011 Shirley Lim and Marshall Cavendish International (Asia) Private Limited
Published by Marshall Cavendish Editions An imprint of Marshall Cavendish International 1 New Industrial Road, Singapore 536196
The short stories and poems published here were first seen in the following books: Life s Mysteries: The Best of Shirley Lim first published in 1995 by Times Editions Pte Ltd; Crossing the Peninsula and Other Poems first published in 1980 by Heinemann; Monsoon History: Selected Poems first published in 1994 by Skoob Pacifica; What the Fortune Teller Didn t Say (poems) first published in 1998 by West End Press; Listening to the Singer: New and Selected Malaysian Poems first published in 2007 by Maya Press; and Walking Backwards: New Poems first published in 2010 by Went End Press.
Cover design by Benson Tan
All rights reserved
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owner. Request for permission should be addressed to the Publisher, Marshall Cavendish International (Asia) Private Limited, 1 New Industrial Road, Singapore 536196. Tel: [phone], fax: [phone]. E-mail: [e-mail] . Website: www.marshallcavendish.com/genref
The publisher makes no representation or warranties with respect to the contents of this book, and specifically disclaims any implied warranties or merchantability or fitness for any particular purpose, and shall in no events be liable for any loss of profit or any other commercial damage, including but not limited to special, incidental, consequential, or other damages.
Other Marshall Cavendish Offices Marshall Cavendish Ltd. PO Box 65829, London EC1P 1NY, UK Marshall Cavendish Corporation. 99 White Plains Road, Tarrytown NY 10591-9001, USA Marshall Cavendish International (Thailand) Co Ltd. 253 Asoke, 12th Flr, Sukhumvit 21 Road, Klongtoey Nua, Wattana, Bangkok 10110, Thailand Marshall Cavendish (Malaysia) Sdn Bhd, Times Subang, Lot 46, Subang Hi-Tech Industrial Park, Batu Tiga, 40000 Shah Alam, Selangor Darul Ehsan, Malaysia
Marshall Cavendish is a trademark of Times Publishing Limited
National Library Board Singapore Cataloguing in Publication Data
Lim, Shirley.
The Shirley Lim collection. - Singapore : Marshall Cavendish Editions, c2011.
p. cm.
eISBN : 978 981 4484 37 4
I. Title.
PS3562.I459

811.54 - dc22
OCN726800497
Printed by Fabulous Printers Pte Ltd

Contents
Short Stories
Journey (1967)
The Touring Company (1968)
The Farmer s Wife (1972)
Conversations of Young Women (1972)
Two Dreams (1974)
Transportation in Westchester (1976)
A Pot of Rice (1977)
Blindness (1977)
All My Uncles (1978)
Life s Mysteries (1981)
Keng Hua (1981)
The Good Old Days (1981)
Mr Tang s Girls (1981)
Haunting (1981)
Another Country (1981)
Native Daughter (1985)
Thirst (1985)
The Bridge (1985)
Hunger (1990)
Flash Fiction
Celestina (2004)
Love Story (2004)
Mariana (2004)
Sixty (2004)
Poetry
Crossing the Peninsula
Monsoon History
When
I Remember
Fear
Reminder to the Young
My Father
Potions
Mother s Song
Shopping
Daphne
Queens
Christmas in Exile
Visiting Malacca
To Li Po
Translation from Other Languages
Modern Secrets
New England
Thoughts from Abroad
Winter Approaching
Night Perspective
Character-Sketch
In Praise of a Master
The Look Turned Inwards
A Life of Imagination
Imagine
Thoughts on a Cezanne Still-Life
To Marianne Moore
The Painter
Piano-Player
The Radio
Land-Turtle
Shells
Cactus
In Defense of the Crooked
No Alarms
Night Vision
Winter Air
No One
Dedicated to Confucius Plaza
House-Hunting
Danny Boy
Smoking
I would like
Seven Years
Images of Love Rejected
Silence
Divorce
In Cities, Some Old Women
Women s Dreams
No Man s Grove
Returning to the Missionary School
Sugar-Cane
My Father s Sadness
Bukit China
Inventing Mothers
Song of an Old Malayan
Pantoun for Chinese Women
August Heat
Summer Bugs
I Look For Women
Family Album
I Defy You
Chinese in Academia
Lament
What the Fortune Teller Didn t Say
Learning English
My Mother Wasn t
Mother s Shoes
Starlight Haven
Ah Mah
Father in China
Black and White
Father From Asia
Watching
Listening to the Singer
Mango
Lost Name Woman
Greenhouse Effect in New York
Riding into California
The Whistler
Romancing Bukowski
Learning to Love America
Starry Night
In California with Neruda
Oranges
Scavenging on Double Bluff
Seaweeds
Fu
Sweet-peas
Burning Gold Paper
The Mourning Months
Past Danger and Drowning
Bogie Hole
Passport
The Source
Marble and Peonies
Blossoming
City Pastoral
Your First Birthday
Seminar Series
Feng Shui
Generations and History
Keeping Your Distance
Solitary
The Ex-Lover
GLOSSARY
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Short Stories
Journey (1967)
The Touring Company (1968)
The Farmer s Wife (1972)
Conversations of Young Women (1972)
Two Dreams (1974)
Transportation in Westchester (1976)
A Pot of Rice (1977
Blindness (1977
All My Uncles (1978)
Life s Mysteries (1981)
Keng Hua (1981)
The Good Old Days (1981)
Mr Tang s Girls (1981)
Haunting (1981)
Another Country (1981)
Native Daughter (1985)
Thirst (1985)
The Bridge (1985)
Hunger (1990)
Journey (1967)
LAST NIGHT, SHE had dreamt she was shut away in a subterranean world; she had wandered in labyrinths of a thick brown claustrophobia. So dense was the air that her ears felt clogged with cotton-wool, and her feet trod slippery over ground strewn with skulls. This dense silence was her holding her breath, conscious of malevolent eyes in the darkness, watching. Skulls smiled without friendship, then began moving around her, in slow monotony, circling formally, one after the other, as in a ritual dance. She knew then that if she could not open her eyes she would never find her way back. She would have to stay in that labyrinthine world, separated from that breathing body which was hers, but which lay apart, secure in bed and lost. She tried to cry out. Only her mouth twisted soundlessly. She concentrated on opening her eyes, counting one two three, pitching her muscles for the effort, but it was a long time before she succeeded. Night was blacker than the dream twilight. It walled up and pressed into her eyes, a pleasant sensation recalling her from the trembling sweet terror into which she had tumbled.
Now she sat in the half-empty bus. It jolted to a halt at every stop, but no one got in, nor did anyone get off. She was caught up in its reckless rush as it butted stubbornly against the road curb, swung around corners with a wounded shriek, shaking its whole frame in a frenzy of movement, unthinking, self-absorbed, down the straight roads past the housing estates. On either side, the rows of houses started up, then fell back, enshrouded in the greying evening. Now they put on their lights, dusky yellow, blue and dim, smoky red, futile stabs in the twilight which invaded the interior of the bus with a deeper gloom. Stars and moon had not yet shown themselves, perhaps would not appear tonight. The passengers were as dull as the sky. Each sat shut in by whatever thoughts bred in his mind with the coming night, eyes marshalled inwards, only flickering to the doorway in anticipation at every violent thrust of the brakes. But no one passed through the doorway, either going down or coming up. The one woman appeared as well-worn as her samfoo , exhausted and faded by having had too many children, too much labour done, too many years lived. The collars of the men decapitated their heads f